8 Summer Studies of Birds and Books CHAP. 



ticulate cry for help has produced at least a little 

 fresh patching. Who it was who thus preferred to 

 let his Bible speak for him I know not; probably 

 some old fellow, for I doubt whether the rising 

 generation, when once they arrive at the haven of 

 the fourth standard, ever care to set out on their 

 travels in anything that can be called a book, much 

 less in that one which was the only spiritual guide, 

 the only earthly literature, of their fathers for many 

 ages. "What we borrow from a thousand books 

 our fathers were forced to borrow from one " ; and 

 our fathers are still living in their descendants in 

 many a remote village. 



In the whole of the allotments this poor gate is 

 the only object that is not being touched to-day by 

 some kind of a newness of life, for even the stone 

 wall itself can show a few stray weeds or grasses 

 beginning to shoot out of its chinks. Let us leave 

 it and stroll round the further fields before the sun 

 leaves us ; it is quieter there, and we shall hear 

 what birds are singing. 



The first song we hear is a Chaffinch's, and it is 

 a song about which I have something to say. This 

 bird has indeed for some time been getting its song 

 ready, and now, in all the splendour of spring 

 plumage, is singing it without a mistake all round 

 us ; but do not suppose that it has been able to 

 achieve this without hard practice. I have never 



